Touch a Button on Your Clothing if You See a Hearse
by Zagzagael
Summary: While in the train car at Terminus, Daryl tells Maggie about Beth being gone.


Daryl knew all about bad omens and superstitions.

_A bird in the house, death's on the way. Step on a crack in the sidewalk, your mother would break her back. If a woman heavy with child looked at a corpse, her unborn would be stillborn. Three on a match, someone would catch a bullet. Hold your breath walkin' past the graveyard or you'd be next._

And in the new world, the turned world, where the dead already walked and death was breathin' down all their necks, they still had omens and superstitious behavior when it came down to it. They'd come round to the same place wherein speaking aloud the name of the gone was to curse yourself. With unstoppable tears. So, they avoided remembrances as though the names of the beloved carried bad tidings. You could say a kind word or two about the dead, but never ever let the word of someone _just gone_ slip out of your mouth unless you were down on your knees in the wood duff praying to a god that had seemed to have been rendered deaf by the sound of his own grief, mebbe.

But, in the train car, in the gloom, filled with fear and a hatred so real it tasted like what human meat might taste like, Daryl staggered his weight from one foot to the next, his spine itching with the effort of holding himself back and finally he just decided.

If they was in purgatory and it sure felt like one lousy step away from hell, then he was gonna atone for some sins. He stepped, unsteady and unsure, but took the long strides over to where Maggie was sitting cross-legged with Glenn asleep, head in her lap. He hunkered down in front of her, forearms on his knees, hands hanging helpless, and she looked up, all doe-eyed and so reminiscent of Beth that he felt a cold chill move through him and settle like upset in his belly.

He breathed in until his lungs wanted to burst and then he turned his head and brought his thumb up between his teeth and bit it good until he could think of nothing but that stinging pain. Without his consent, his body folded forward onto his knees and he sat back on his haunches.

"Daryl?" Maggie whispered, concerned.

And that stung him worse than his own chewed nailbed. He didn't deserve anyone to feel concerned for him or about him. He pulled his thumb out of his mouth and ran his knuckles under his nose and back across his lips. He nodded. "I gotta tell you something. It's good and it's so bad."

Her eyes grew very wide, he could only see the whites of them in the dark car. "Alright."

He could tell already that she knew he was going to speak her name.

"Go on then," she urged him.

"Beth might be alive."

She gasped and Glenn stirred beneath her stilled fingertips.

"Tell me."

He shook his head in a twisted approximation of a nod. "We got out together. From the prison. Ya know."

She nodded, of course she knew.

He was losing it, faster then he thought. The curse of saying her name out loud was overtaking him, crawling up his spine, creeping out each one of his ribs, settling in a place behind his breastbone, beating its way up his throat, and threatening the back of his tongue. He sniffed and pressed the side of his hand in between his eyes. "We was together." That didn't sound right, but it had been right, hadn't it? He knew it had. "Her and me, we were makin' it work. Stayin' safe, looking out for each other. She's tougher than any of us knew."

"Oh, Beth," Maggie's voice was strangled.

He choked back a sob. "Yeah. Anyway. Found this place. I shoulda known something weren't right with it, but it felt okay, like it was gonna be okay. There was a piano."

Maggie was nodding now, tears dripping off her chin.

"I shoulda," he took another breath. "I didn't know."

"What happened, Daryl? I don't understand."

"Yeah. Well, we got attacked by a small herd and I told her to get out. Get outta the house. Run. I'd meet up with her. Catch up with her. I wanted her to be safe. But when I worked through the Walkers and got to the place I told her to wait," he pushed his tongue down between his lower front teeth and his lip. "Someone took her. I saw the car. And her stuff was scattered all around. I chased them down all night, but I couldn't keep up."

"No," Maggie agreed that he would not have been able to keep up with a car.

"Yeah," Daryl had no idea what it was he was affirming.

They sat injured, a gaping wide space opening between them, a wounding that could not be stitched closed. Suddenly Rick was there, beside him, a strong arm slung around his shoulders, pulling him fast against his chest and Daryl went, curling himself into the other man's arms, an awkward male surrender. He was crying but would not allow himself to sob. He thought he'd wept himself dry, but here were the tears again, fresh and accusatory and threatening to drown him in a sea of regret.

"It's alright, Daryl. It's alright. You were keeping her safe. You were watchin' over her. And when we get out of this," Rick paused, feeling Daryl strengthen his bones in his embrace, "we'll go look for her."

"Until we find her," Daryl promised, muffled into Rick's coat.

"Thank you," Maggie was leaning over to him, over Glenn rousing, reaching for his face and kissing him on the cheek. "I'm so glad t'hear she got out and that she was with you. That she wasn't alone and that she wasn't scared. I know it might sound crazy, but I actually feel hopeful."

"Yeah?"

She nodded.

"She wasn't scared. And she wasn't alone. Least for a while, we weren't." Daryl squeezed Rick's shoulder in gratitude and pulled himself back onto the balls of his feet, wiping at his face with both open palms. He felt his heart open as he closed his eyes and remembered Beth and he felt his own body fill with a flame of hope.


End file.
